


Kiss The Good Life Goodbye

by nothing_rhymes_with_ianto



Category: Torchwood
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-06
Updated: 2012-12-06
Packaged: 2017-11-20 11:25:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,039
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/584898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nothing_rhymes_with_ianto/pseuds/nothing_rhymes_with_ianto
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As much as he tries to act mature and tough, Diane can tell he’s a child.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Kiss The Good Life Goodbye

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the "de-aging" square of angst_bingo.

_It's the good life to be free and explore the unknown_  
Like the heartaches when you learn you must face them alone  
Please remember I still want you, and in case you wonder why  
Well, just wake up, kiss the good life goodbye  
\- The Good Life by Tony Bennett  
___________________  
  
  
She can’t help but pity him. As much as he tries to act mature and tough, Diane can tell he’s a child. He’s awkward around her, twitchy and nervous. He’s like a puppy, she thinks. She wants to laugh when he tries to ask her out. But she doesn’t. Because she does love him. She has since he sat beside her and asked her about her life.

She can see him clinging to her. She doesn’t know anything about his life here in this job, in this time, but she can guess. She’s seen gazes like his back home. Owen has lost someone important and is drifting. She can tell that much. And he expects her to hold him up. He loves her because he thinks she can fix him. She can’t. She knows she can’t. She knows he can only fix himself. She also knows he wouldn’t listen if she tried to tell him that.

But she loves him. So she lets him buy her a dress, lets him dance with her. Tries to ease his disappointment and her own when she can’t fly her beloved plane. When they dance, he holds her with longing, as if some rare beautiful thing. She can see the blind adoration in his eyes, the childlike love and she has to look away from its gripping need. He spins her and she laughs and stares up at the sky, and her heart clenches with the need to be _there_ , in the sky, in the air, free. He wraps his arms around her as if begging her to stay. She’s not sure how to. She’s never had her feet on the ground for long.

Owen’s skin is flushed and damp where Diane leans against him, and she can see his body twitch as his breathing hitches. “I can’t concentrate. All I see is you, all I can think about is what you’re wearing, what you’re thinking, what your face looks like when you come. It’s been, what, a week?” He sounds so vulnerable, worried and confused and she wonders just how long it’s been since he’s felt like this, wonders what went wrong before. “And it—it’s like when I’m not with you, I’m out of focus. How have you done this to me?”

And she watches him fall apart in front of her, watches his defences crumble, sees the fear in his eyes and the need and the adoration and the confusion and wishes there was something she could do to help him.

“I’m scared,” he admits to her. “I’m fucking scared.”

She knows what he means. He’s a child, he’s lonely and hurting and he loves her in a way that gives him false hope. He loves her and thinks her a saviour. She knows she can’t be that for him, but she also knows that she can at least settle his mind.

“I love you, too.” She tells him. He’s trembling under her hand, breath jumping and hitching. She can see in his eyes that Owen is relieved that she said that, and only that. So she kisses him and holds him in silence until his breathing evens out.

She lies awake the entire night, thinking about her decision. It feels cruel, almost, but if she stays, she’ll be the one who’s lost forever. She’ll be grounded and sad and Owen won’t ever be saved, by her or anyone else. She watches Owen sleep, his face smooth and innocent in slumber, and wishes she could help. But she can’t, and so she hopes and counts on the fact that somehow Owen will find help inside himself or someone else. Because she knows that as much as he loves her, she cannot give him what he wants.

The bus ride to the hangar is cold and feels like an eternity. But she’s set in her decision. She knows where she belongs. She knows the sky is her home, she knows her plane was named after herself and not the engine. She knows there’s only one way to find her way back.

“And what about me?” Owen demands, and she wishes she could answer his selfish question, wishes she could placate the disappointed child in him. He looks up at her with eyes full of tears, and she wishes she could love him as much as he loves her. “Please. Please, don’t go.”

She has to. She knows she does. But she can’t leave him empty. She can see that he’ll break if she leaves him empty. So she wraps her scarf around his neck the way women used to give their lovers handkerchief favours and kisses him with everything she feels. It’s an improper goodbye, but it’s all she has. And she knows she’ll be leaving better, stronger, for knowing him.

“What memories I’m taking with me.” There’s nothing else she can say that will tell him what she feels. It’s not something she can put into words.

He stares at her, shaking, fighting back tears, until he seems to make a decision and slowly, slowly lets go of the sill and backs away. She blows a kiss to him, looking back to see his face in a grimace of grief. But she has to go. The plane coasts out, turns back, and she can see his figure hunched at the side of the runway, watching her, an agonized farewell. The pull of the sky is strong, though, and as the plane picks up speed and lifts off the ground, she feels free for the first time in a week. She flies higher, higher into the great blue and she knows she’ll find her way somewhere, if not home.

For a moment, though, she almost regrets leaving the lost boy down below, with his sad brown eyes and adoration. For a moment, she wants to stay on the ground with him, for him. For a moment, she wants to turn back.


End file.
